Promise
by Feral Smile
Summary: Naruto never breaks his promises.


**Promise**

_Feral Smile_**  
**

* * *

A hollow knocking echoed through the house, drawing my attention. I slipped my apron from the bottom drawer of the cupboard, threw it over my head, and cinched it around my waist. Flour from yesterday's batch of noodles puffed into the air as the knot tightened, and I felt the smooth fabric under my fingers before I let go. I moved my hand and twisted my hair into a bun as I turned towards the door and shouted,

"Coming!"

Helping daddy at the ramen stand had been just about been the only thing that kept me going when he left. My bright orange ball of perpetual energy and voracious appetite. I remember his first time visiting the stand. We were both very young and he was very grubby, dirt under his fingernails. He climbed up onto the stool and dropped a handful of coins on the counter, not looking daddy quite in the eyes. I remember looking up at my father and seeing the pity and kindness there. He mumbled something under his breath and the kid perked up immediately.

"Really Old Man?!" Naruto clapped his dirty hands together happily, "I've never had free ramen before!"

Daddy chuckled and put on the mask I have come to know so well to exchange kind words to the boy before brushing past me to make the boys ramen. When I turned to watch, I noticed his mask had dropped and he had a serious expression on his face. I turned back to the kid in the black shirt and orange spiral.

"What's your name?" I asked him, straining to get up on a bar stool.

He shyly scratched the back of his head, blushed and told me his name. He ended his sentence with some strange phrase. This phrase I have gotten very familiar with over the coming years. He has gotten better, but even today he still utters '_dattebayo' _when he's stressed or excited.

I remembered years later when he sat next to his Academy teacher and begged him to try on his forehead protector. This was just after he managed to evade other ninja for over an hour when he had defaced the Hokage monument. His weird orange jumper had smudges of paint all over it, and he had a bit of wet paint stuck in his hair. As he broke his chopsticks apart, I had leaned over the table and flicked it from his hair. Realizing what I had done, I blushed and ran to the back of the restaurant where they couldn't see me as I heard his teacher asking who his girlfriend was.

Later, after he earned his forehead protector he had come to show it off, still with his teacher, who I now knew was named Iruka. He angled it to catch the light as he grinned that infectious smile of his and I watched daddy smile that rare smile that has been reserved for just me and Naruto. I got to make that bowl. I put extra meat and two eggs in, and used our finest ingredients. I didn't tell daddy, but I think he knew anyway.

Back in the real world I cast about for the cloth that holds back my hair, eventually finding it draped across the back of a chair. I tied it and felt warm inside as I recalled the time Naruto had untied it from my head and told me I was pretty, before realizing what he said and running from me. This was right before his Chuunin exam. I had given him the most expensive bowl of ramen we served with extra everything as a token of good luck. After eating it, he had reached across the counter as I had done years previously and slipped off my hair tie, telling me I was 'super pretty' with my hair down. Then the look of utter horror on his face when he realized what he had said. The poor guy ran towards the Chuunin staging area so fast that he kicked up dust as he went. I smiled to myself and didn't wear my hair tie for the rest of the day.

This boy has saved my daddy. After mom went missing, he stopped eating and stayed in his room to cry. I stayed with a family friend, the father of Nishi. Whenever I went to the house to check on him, with Nishi and Nishi's mom, he would just yell at us and howl until we left. Even when Matsu's dad came and lectured him about how he was neglecting his daughter, daddy still cried. But he started eating. And eventually started working. I helped him in the shop as best as I could, but he never smiled anymore. Not when I brought him a bouquet of flowers from the field next to the park, and not when I made him a picture of us making ramen together. He just put on that mask for the customers and smiled at me, but I knew better.

To this day, I remember his howl of anguish when he answered the door. I remember peeking from over his head as he sank to his knees at the Shinobi at our doorstep. I clutched the railing at the bottom of our stairs and watched with wide eyes as the ninja sank down, and put a hand on my father's shoulder. The old ninja with kind eyes. The ninja who was wearing full formal dress uniform, complete with white gloves.

Mother went missing in action, and after three months, was declared dead. It changed daddy. And no matter what, I couldn't help him or save him. Until Naruto came around. Naruto pulled my daddy from the darkness. Naruto gave me my daddy back.

And that's why I kissed him when he came back. Two and a half years I waited for him, and when he returned, I pulled him clear across the counter and kissed him, startling his friends and flat out shocking him. I served him a huge bowl of our best ramen and that night I went home with him. Ever since then he has been _my_ Naruto. He would sometimes come and help make ramen, and of course the stinker was great at it, much better than I was when I first started. When my daddy retired and I took over the shop, I remade it into a Tsukumen bar. Naruto was pissed and then finally when I convinced him to try it, the stinker just mixed the bowls together to make ramen out of it. I chased him out.

Once I came back though, three of him stood behind the counter, and one stood in front of me. Instead of his weird black and orange uniform, he was wearing his black red and white service dress, the formal stuff that makes him look so damned hot. His forehead protector gleamed in the daylight, and as his clones serenaded us, he sank to a knee and presented me with a beautiful diamond ring.

I rewarded him with ramen and other things later that night. The bar remained Ichiraku, but I took his name and moved in with him. When he goes away on month-long deployments as a Jounin, doing who knows what kind of dangerous missions, I occupy myself with the shop. He always comes back; he made me a promise. Naruto never breaks his promises.

The knocking sounded a third time, and I moved towards the large mahogany double doors. I moved past the coat rack on the left, and grabbed the knob.

Something made me pause. A deep foreboding somewhere in the pit of my stomach. I felt a vast expanse under where my heart was, and suddenly I was scared.

I pulled open the door. Briefly, the sunlight blinded me. There, before me on the porch where I had kissed my husband goodbye just two weeks ago, a tall Shinobi dressed in full formal wear came slowly into focus. He had on a black head covering, and a somber, formal forehead protector. Under his greying hair, eyes watched me. On his chest was a large block of ribbons, his achievements staring me in the eye.

He started to bend to my height, and I stared into his eyes. So impossibly kind, those eyes. He reached for me slowly, and I vaguely heard my father scream my name. The Shinobi turned towards him, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw my father running towards me in what seemed like slow motion. His mouth was moving, but all I heard was a loud roaring in my ears.

The man before me focused on me again, and that withered mouth opened to impart those dreaded words. The words every military wife has nightmares of. I felt my heart shatter over the expanse in my chest, quietly falling away from me. I felt hollow. I felt empty.

I noticed idly that my fists were clenched. The flour on my apron stood in painful detail to my eyes. Wooden porch had a small crack where time had eaten at it. I could see my reflection in the old Shinobi's highly polished shoes.

He was on his knees, and I realized I was as well. I stared into his incredibly gentle eyes. The words dropped from his lips, and as each one came, I felt a piece of myself die.

"I…" He touched my shoulder softly, "am so sorry…"

Naruto never breaks his promises.

I started to scream.


End file.
